El-Assasif () is a

necropolis A necropolis (: necropolises, necropoles, necropoleis, necropoli) is a large, designed cemetery with elaborate tomb monuments. The name stems from the Ancient Greek ''nekropolis'' (). The term usually implies a separate burial site at a distan ...

near

Luxor Luxor is a city in Upper Egypt. Luxor had a population of 263,109 in 2020, with an area of approximately and is the capital of the Luxor Governorate. It is among the List of oldest continuously inhabited cities, oldest continuously inhabited c ...

on the West Bank at

Thebes, Egypt Thebes (, , ''Thēbai''), known to the ancient Egyptians as Waset, was an ancient Egyptian city located along the Nile about south of the Mediterranean. Its ruins lie within the modern Egyptian city of Luxor. Thebes was the main city of the fo ...

Upper Egypt Upper Egypt ( ', shortened to , , locally: ) is the southern portion of Egypt and is composed of the Nile River valley south of the delta and the 30th parallel North. It thus consists of the entire Nile River valley from Cairo south to Lake N ...

. It is located in the dry bay that leads up to

Deir el-Bahari Deir el-Bahari or Dayr al-Bahri (, , ) is a complex of mortuary temples and tombs located on the west bank of the Nile, opposite the city of Luxor, Egypt. This is a part of the Theban Necropolis. History Deir el-Bahari, located on the west ...

and south of the necropolis of

Dra' Abu el-Naga' The necropolis of Draʻ Abu el-Naga () is located on the West Bank of the Nile at Thebes, Egypt, just by the entrance of the dry bay that leads up to Deir el-Bahari and north of the necropolis of el-Assasif. The necropolis is located near the Va ...

. El-Assasif contains burials from the 18th, 22nd, 25th and 26th dynasties of

ancient Egypt Ancient Egypt () was a cradle of civilization concentrated along the lower reaches of the Nile River in Northeast Africa. It emerged from prehistoric Egypt around 3150BC (according to conventional Egyptian chronology), when Upper and Lower E ...

, covering the period c. 1550 to 525 BC across all three dynasties.

Archaeology

In November 2018, France's

University of Strasbourg The University of Strasbourg (, Unistra) is a public research university located in Strasbourg, France, with over 52,000 students and 3,300 researchers. Founded in the 16th century by Johannes Sturm, it was a center of intellectual life during ...

announced the discovery of two

sarcophagi A sarcophagus (: sarcophagi or sarcophaguses) is a coffin, most commonly carved in stone, and usually displayed above ground, though it may also be buried. The word ''sarcophagus'' comes from the Greek σάρξ ' meaning "flesh", and φ� ...

thought to be more than 3,500 years old with two perfectly preserved mummies and approximately 1,000 funerary statues in the Assasif valley near Luxor. One of the tombs with paintings where the female body found, was opened to the public in front of the international media, but the other one was previously opened by Egyptian antiquities officials. In October 2019, 30 coffins (3.000 year-old) were uncovered and presented, dating back to the Twenty-second Dynasty by the Egyptian archaeological mission in front of the Hatshepsut Temple. The coffins contain mummies of 23 adult males, five adult females and two children. The condition of the cachette is said to be exceptionally good, with many of the coffins sealed and intact, with high quality painting and preservation. According to archaeologist Zahi Hawass, mummies were decorated with mixed carvings and designs, including scenes from

Egyptian gods Ancient Egyptian deities are the gods and goddesses worshipped in ancient Egypt. The beliefs and rituals surrounding these gods formed the core of ancient Egyptian religion, which emerged sometime in prehistory. Deities represented natural for ...

hieroglyph Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs ( ) were the formal writing system used in Ancient Egypt for writing the Egyptian language. Hieroglyphs combined ideographic, logographic, syllabic and alphabetic elements, with more than 1,000 distinct characters. ...

s, and the

Book of the Dead The ''Book of the Dead'' is the name given to an Ancient Egyptian funerary texts, ancient Egyptian funerary text generally written on papyrus and used from the beginning of the New Kingdom of Egypt, New Kingdom (around 1550 BC) to around 50 BC ...

, a series of spells that allowed the soul to navigate the afterlife. Some of the coffins had the names of the dead engraved on them.

Notable burials

18th Dynasty

TT192 Tomb TT192, located in the necropolis of El-Assasif in Thebes, Egypt, is the tomb of Kheruef, also called Senaa, who was Steward to the Great Royal Wife Tiye, during the reign of Amenhotep III. It is located in El-Assasif, part of the Theban Necr ...

– Kharuef * AT28 – Vizier Amenhotep-Huy * TT188 – Parennefer

22nd Dynasty

Cachette currently under investigation and restoration

25th Dynasty

* TT34 – Mentuemhet * TT37 – Harwa

26th Dynasty

* TT27 – Sheshonq *

TT33 The TT-30, commonly known simply as the Tokarev, is a Soviet-made semi-automatic pistol. It was developed during the late 1920s by Fedor Tokarev as a service pistol for the Soviet Armed Forces and was based on the earlier pistol designs of John ...

– Padiamenope *

TT36 The Thebes, Egypt, Theban Tomb TT36 is located in El-Assasif, part of the Theban Necropolis, on the west bank of the Nile, opposite to Luxor. It is the burial place of the ancient Egyptian Ibi (Egyptian Noble), Ibi, who was "Chief Steward of the ...

– Ibi * TT279 –

Pabasa The ancient Egyptian noble Pabasa was chief steward of the God's Wife of Amun Nitocris I during the Saite Period. He is buried in tomb TT279, which is located in the El-Assasif, part of the Theban Necropolis, near Thebes. His sarcophagus ...

* TT389 – Basa * TT410 – Mutirdis * TT414 – Ankhhor

References

{{Coord, 25, 43, 58, N, 32, 36, 47, E, display=title, region:EG_type:city_source:frwiki Theban tombs